


Outcomes of War

by lost_spook



Category: Enemy at the Door (TV)
Genre: 5 Times, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Execution, Gen, Post-Series, Starvation, Suicide, War, World War II
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-26
Updated: 2014-01-26
Packaged: 2018-01-10 03:12:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,430
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1154083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lost_spook/pseuds/lost_spook
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>"Whatever may be the abuse of man, that is the use of nature - first survive.”</i>  Three things that may have happened to Major Richter and two that definitely didn’t.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Outcomes of War

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally started to fill the "future fic" square for Trope Bingo Round 2. Despite the premise, there are very few spoilers for the series - mostly minor/indirect.

* * *

**I. This Never Happened Anywhere (July, 1936)**

One day, as the sun shines in Wiesbaden and the bands play, Dieter Richter – who is not a soldier – runs into a pair of English holiday-makers, a doctor and his wife from the Channel Islands. 

There is no war, no prospect of war. No Austrian Corporal came to power, though there are other problems enough for Germany and the Republic still trembles a little every time one politician or another treads too heavily. The British military presence is gone from the Rhine and there is now no real reminder or threat of war here.

Richter is visiting home, since he has more recently moved to Berlin. His wife, Anna, who is a translator of some renown, won a coveted post at the Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität. It took him a little longer to find something in his own field to follow her, but he has. He is only out here now, because he needs to clear his mind – to straighten out an argument in his current paper over which he seems to have tied himself in knots.

He once studied at Cambridge and still, despite the War, has fond memories of England and the English – and Trumpington Street, where there were cherry trees all along. Were it not for those world events, and of course, for Anna, who has her work here, he could have thought of returning. So, he talks to the English visitors. It is entirely natural for him to do so.

They are from Guernsey, a place of which he knows very little. Had they not said, he might have thought it one of the Scottish islands. So he asks the polite questions, he is genuinely interested in the answers, and asks them how they are enjoying their stay.

Very much, the doctor says. It’s been the first holiday they’ve had without their children, who are now grown up enough to allow the two of them to holiday here and forget their responsibilities, and they’re making the most of it.

He smiles. It’s gratifying to hear, he tells them, and advises them what other sights they should see.

The sun shines, the band plays. He is not a solider, hopes never to be so again, and there is no thought of war, no need for enmity between them.

* * *

**II. Defused (July 1944)**

It is not a good time. The tide of war has turned sharply and now they are more than becalmed here – they have been cast up ashore; they are marooned on this island, a fate of their own making.

Richter can see the end in sight – he is ever the realist, the pragmatist – but that is not to say that others in command will admit it, or surrender the islands to the British. That promises inevitable hardship. Rations are already low, conditions not good. They will grow worse the longer this continues, now that the Channel Islands are isolated. 

So, it is not a good time, even before Freidel passes on the news in a careful yet casual aside: he is warning him. A plot to assassinate the Führer has failed – and now General Beck is dead by his own hand, and von Wittke shot, among others.

It is a body blow, though Richter may not give any outward sign that that is so, not even to Ernst Freidel. These are the men he had counted on to return sanity to his country, to end this war before Germany is utterly destroyed. 

It is not a good time, therefore, to be a man of whom General Beck speaks highly, or a man who was trusted by von Wittke to take him to Torteval one stormy night, a fact of which the Gestapo are aware – of which Sturmbannführer Reinicke is aware. It is not a good time to be the husband of a woman who has once already been arrested by the Gestapo for expressing regret over the Führer’s survival on another occasion.

Oh, he is not involved – he could not be involved, that is preposterous – but Reinicke, representing the SS here on Guernsey, would be more than happy to use such things. Were it only Reinicke, he perhaps need not fear. General Müller would not listen to mere rumour, spread out of envy and ambition. It might become politic to remove Richter from this position – the Islands are rarely out of the Führer’s thoughts, so they hear – but nothing more, not on such flimsy grounds. However, now there is also the newly arrived Admiral, a Nazi with all the zeal of an evangelical lay preacher. He and Reinicke together may need no more. And Reinicke will tell him, Richter knows. It will be no more than his duty, of course. What else could a loyal officer of the SS do?

“That is terrible news,” is all he says to Ernst.

Freidel nods as he sits at his desk opposite. “Terrible,” he agrees, and they let what they mean by that fall between them in the room. Richter, though, catches the look of concern that Ernst does not quite manage to conceal and wonders what the other fears.

Of course, there is another question. Oberst Richter is a man in a responsible position; he is a man who has served with General Beck, who shares a home town with him – they are both from Wiesbaden – and who is considered trustworthy by him and by von Wittke. It is unlikely, but it is not impossible that someone has done more than speak highly of him. It is possible that the name of the Kommandant of Guernsey is noted in someone’s letters, someone’s diary, and the Gestapo are out for blood; they all know that. If so, it would be a fatal compliment.

He does not know, in the event, which of these fears is true – that there is nothing to act on but Reinicke’s words, or someone somewhere thought Oberst Richter might be a useful man should their plans succeed. He is removed from his post – sent elsewhere, but he knows what will await him at his destination.

He will never know now whether it was shadow or substance, for they will shoot him first.

* * *

**III. Bleak Midwinter (December 1944)**

He does not know what causes the British to delay sending aid to their own people. Most likely it is still the fear of feeding the enemy. Is that so much worse, he thinks (and cannot comprehend it in his heart, even if his mind acknowledges the reasoning) than the fear of one’s fellow countrymen dying of disease and starvation?

If it were in his power, he would surrender. The war may not yet be over, but it has, he feels, already been lost. Certainly it has been lost here on this island. Yet the Admiral will not give in, that he knows. Death or glory would be more in his style, Richter thinks, and the knowledge of that brings the taste of fear to his mouth. General Müller, though, also will not surrender without orders and there have been reverses – the war is not going all the Allies’ way. Müller also tells Richter, grimly, that it is worse elsewhere in Europe; they are not the only ones in this bloody mess.

So, they sit here on a glorified rock in the middle of the English Channel and prepare to starve to death, or die of disease, or merely to freeze from the cold. They are nearly out of food, they are out of coal, gas, medical supplies – there are no more anaesthetics here – water supplies are low and there is correspondingly very little power.

No, that is not true; _he_ will not starve to death, not yet at least, nor die of disease. The Islanders will die first, and he can at least hope that General Müller will surrender before all his men die. So, he will in all probability survive, but many, too many, will die. They will starve to death and before that many will weaken and die of other causes – first the young, the elderly, the ill, those whose health has already been damaged by periods of imprisonment in France. It is a fact; it has already begun. It is also a thought he finds intolerable. 

Freidel, though, is not alarmist. He looks surprised when Richter speaks of the possibility. Freidel says the British will send aid, he has no doubt of it even now – or says he has. Then he points out the difficulties and delays involved in getting one government to act, let alone several. 

And that is true, Richter acknowledges, but he thinks again of men he’s known, men who are generals now in Whitehall, men who are capable of thoughtlessly barking “Let them starve!” just to show the blasted enemy. They already threaten to accuse them of war crimes for not feeding the populace, though it is the British who blockade them. Or maybe it is to show their people, who didn’t put up enough of a fight to please them. A month or so ago, Richter still had hope, but now it evades him; he cannot see why they delay if they mean to send help.

The war is lost; he only wishes it were over. They have lost ground everywhere and with it men; General Beck and others Richter regarded highly are dead, failing to kill the Führer, and he has not heard from Anna since and does not know if that is due to her usual terrible correspondence skills, or letters inevitably lost in the circumstances, or if there is a more sinister reason. She may have spoken out again – he can picture it only too clearly – or there are air raids and he does not know. It seems likeliest to him now that she is also gone. Leave these days, when it can be had, is not a blessing but a curse – news from home adds to the lack of morale.

There is widespread thieving and looting on the island – mostly the men, but also the Islanders. They try, but it is beyond their power now to stop it entirely. Last time Dr Martel was here, last time it had been worth him expending precious energy on an increasingly pointless exercise, he had been indignant about a man who had had to risk his life to defend two carrots – all that he had with which to feed his family – from German soldiers. 

Before that, when the doctor still felt the need to point out the inevitable outcomes of lack of resources to the Feldkommandant, he had been telling Richter about a family whose ninety-year-old mother had fallen ill, thanks to the current dietary limitations. They’d been giving her their child’s milk rations to keep her going. He’d had to tell them that they could save the old lady, or they could save the child, but they’d have to choose one or the other. As if Richter needs such details spelling out to him. The situation has been worsening for months, no, a year or more now; he has had plenty of time to picture what will come of it. 

Richter then said to Martel – though he cannot now remember why – that he was unsure how much of a pragmatist he was, after all, for a pure pragmatist who sees that there is one loaf of bread between two men, calculates which man should have it and thus survive the longer. Richter is more inclined to feel that common humanity dictates that they should break it in half and share it. It was, he had then realised belatedly, somewhere approaching an apology for the situation and thus both fatuous and insulting, possibly egocentric, but Dr Martel had managed a short smile and told him he’d be amazed at this point just to see a loaf of bread, whole or otherwise. If he was especially lucky, he’d added, he was going home to a cauliflower. He didn’t think, from what he’d heard, that German rations were all that much better.

And, no, no they are not, Richter thinks now. The men are constantly hungry, they are all constantly hungry. And it is not as simplistic as his loaf of bread analogy. Even if he had enough to share, the German Military Kommandant cannot run out and give his own rations to an Islander. They are his enemies, and this is war.

Some days it seems the weight of it will keep him from breathing. Müller might have overall responsibility, but he and Freidel oversee affairs on this island; it is his men and in some sense his people who are going to starve and die. Food and supplies are a constant issue – and so the rations begin to stick in his throat. It might be easier not to eat. He was, before, aware of this temptation and ensured that he distracted himself from the thought, or sat with Freidel or Kluge, or even Reinicke. Somewhere a few weeks or so since, it has ceased to be so important: there is too little for any of them, what does it matter any more? If the others are not there, sometimes he takes only ersatz tea or coffee; that doesn’t threaten to choke him. 

He shifts about in his chair, impatiently, and coughs. Everyone suffers from something this winter; even the Kommandant is not immune.

Freidel, nevertheless, looks up at the sound, his expression a mute enquiry.

“Well, damn you, what is it?” Richter snaps, and then apologises for his irritability.

“Nothing, nothing,” says Freidel in an effort to placate. “Merely – are you sure you are well, Dieter?”

He gives him a grimace. “As well as any of us, I suppose. Which currently is to say – not at all.”

“Hmm,” says Freidel, but then he tries again, rather to Richter’s surprise. “It is only that you did not seem yourself earlier. If you _are_ unwell –”

Richter shakes his head. “Ernst, you are beginning to sound like my mother. What is there to do about it, even if I were?”

“Very true,” says Freidel, but he does not look convinced.

Richter stares down at the papers on his desk: orders, orders, complaints, anonymous letters, more complaints, and no doubt Reinicke still wants his own office though the world goes to hell. Damn them all. “I do not think,” he says, half under his breath, without the awareness that he is saying it aloud, “that I can keep the whole loaf.”

“I beg your pardon?” says Freidel. “Dieter?”

He shakes his head, clears it again. “Nothing, Ernst, nothing.”

Later on, whether it is the temperature he’s currently achieved, despair, or what they care to call “Island Madness” here, he sees his duty with a blessed clarity: there is a way to balance pragmatism with humanitarianism. One lets the other man have the whole loaf; one simply removes oneself from the equation. It is the only thing to be done. It seems ridiculous that he has waited this long.

He even makes a note of that, before he finds his revolver and completes his task.

*

Dr Martel’s surprised to find Major Freidel at his door, although it’s happened once or twice since they cut off the phones. He even musters an inward leap of hope, because surely there’s only one piece of news that could have brought him out here this evening, but then he sees the German’s face and sags back into his now constant state of exhaustion.

Freidel gives him a curt, military nod and enters the kitchen. 

“Well, Major?” says Martel, sitting down at the table. “I was hoping this was good news, but I’m guessing not, at least not judging by your expression.”

Freidel hesitates and then Martel nods to him, and he also sits, stiffly, at the far end of the table. “It is good news, Dr Martel – at least I hope so. General Müller and the Bailiff will be meeting again with the British – they propose to send food parcels through the Red Cross. I do not believe help will be long in coming now. I thought you should know.”

“Well, that’s something,” says Martel, and then gives Freidel a sidelong glance. “What’s this other matter, then? You’re telling me I might not have to slowly starve to death after all – what’s the bad news?”

“For you – none,” Freidel says.

Martel gives him another look. “I’d have thought the Colonel would have come himself. Maybe you can pass on a message. The behaviour of your men, Major, does not get any better. Olive and I have to bar the door at night, and for what? To defend half a parsnip, that’s what. Before you lot came here, that’d have been beyond comprehension.”

“I am afraid,” says Freidel, stiffly and correctly, “that I cannot. Oberst Richter is no longer with us.”

That’s not something Martel was expecting. He coughs before he can speak – a gift from the Cherche Midi that returned with this latest bout of deprivation and cold. “Where’ve they sent him? At a time like this?”

“He has not been posted elsewhere,” says Freidel.

Martel sits up. “Good God! Do you mean to tell me that Colonel Richter is _dead_?”

“That,” says Freidel, sounding slightly plaintive, “is what I have been trying to say for the past few minutes.”

Dr Martel nods. “I’m sorry, Major. No, really. What happened? Or is that something you are not permitted to tell me?”

“I cannot see why not.” Freidel turns minutely in his chair. “It will be all over the island soon enough, more’s the pity, but there was no opportunity to hide the facts. I regret to say that – Oberst Richter was unwell yesterday – I noted it myself. He was not himself, you understand - Indeed, there was a note – it made no sense – something quite unintelligible about a loaf of bread –”

Martel nods. “Yes,” he says softly, “yes, I think I do understand, Major. I am _very_ sorry to hear that.”

“Yes.” Freidel’s expression is unusually grim. “And I think we shall all be sorrier still before long.”

Martel cannot argue with him. He’s not privy to the finer details of the politics that go on between the Germans, but he knows enough to understand that Richter managed to filter out some of the worst of the demands of the SS, and that blasted Admiral who’d been wished onto them in the summer. This island, Martel had said, once long ago, can’t afford to lose any more good people, people of sensibility. Richter had been his enemy, but he’d been a decent man, and in an awkward, uneven way, Martel had owed him his life. Martel would these days count him as being one of the people Guernsey couldn’t afford to lose. 

“I went through his effects,” Freidel says, more guarded now. “I thought perhaps – but that is unimportant. I came across this small thing.” He hands over an old picture postcard of Wiesbaden. “I recall Dieter saying that you had visited the Rhine some years ago –”

“One of the small ironies of life, yes,” says Martel, and coughs again.

“He spoke of you only yesterday, you understand – had I seen you, he wanted to know, were you well –”

Martel saves him the trouble by taking the card. “Thank you. Yes.” It shouldn’t be impossible to say such simple things, or that Freidel feels the need to point out there will be nothing incriminating about an unmarked card he might already have had in his possession, come the end of the war, if it ever does come. He turns the faded card over in his hands before putting it down again on the table. “Despite the circumstances, I think it’s fair to say I had a great deal of respect for him, if not perhaps for his office.”

“Thank you, Dr Martel,” says Freidel, getting to his feet, with another of those very correct, slight military bows.

Martel frowns at the card. “Major… did you say a loaf of bread?”

*

Olive comes down afterwards, and finds him still there, looking at the postcard. “Funny,” she says, when he explains, “both of those things should be good news, shouldn’t they?”

“What?” says Martel. “Good show, one less blasted Hun on the island? I suppose it should be cause for celebration.”

“Except it isn’t like that, is it?” she says, and sighs. “Anyway, I don’t think one can have an obligation to feel _glad_ about someone else’s death, not really.”

“Their wretched Führer being the notable exception?”

“Yes, I suppose he’d have to be.”

“I can’t believe it, though,” says Martel. “I remember Richter when I came back from France, going on about survival above everything – and now this. Of all the people on this island, I’d have said he’d be the last to do such a thing. I suppose it just goes to show, doesn’t it?”

Olive put her hand over his on the table. “I don’t know,” she says, and he gives her a surprised glance. “I know,” she says, “but he was here when you were out a week or so ago. And I know none of us are exactly at our best, but he _didn’t_ look well. And – well–”

“Yes?”

“When you were away,” she says, “he came to see me once, about Clare and some other business. He sat opposite me, there, and I – well, I reminded him that we were enemies, and he said, didn’t common humanity come into it? Something like that, anyway. Well, there isn’t much of common humanity left in this now, is there? And I didn’t know him even as well as you did – but, yes, I can imagine that to be in some small way responsible for _this_ –” She gives him an apologetic look. “Everyone has their limits, don’t they?”

It makes sense, and he nods, feeling the weariness again. “Yes. As we all keep finding out.”

She tightens her hold on his hand and says, “We’ll just have to remember the other thing that he said, then – and survive.”

* * *

**IV. Hostages to Fortune (March 1945)**

Admiral Hüffmeier finally makes his move: Muller and virtually all the Wermacht members of the Feldkommandantur are sent away from the Islands, Oberst Richter with them. The only two remaining are Reinicke, who is of course, approved of by the fanatical Admiral, and – somewhat to his surprise – the ever efficient Feldkommandant, Major Freidel. Apparently they feel they cannot do without him.

Freidel hears from Dieter Richter once only after he has left, not shot at least, but returned to the theatre of war in Europe. It is a long time later that he learns that his former Kommandant was dead by the time that brief note reached him.

He thinks, much as Dieter had of others, that it is a terrible waste and he is more sorry than he can say, though whether more or less so because it was so near the end, he does not know. He only hopes that now the war is over that they may finally cease to throw so many lives away.

* * *

**V. After The War Is Over (September 1952)**

Richter writes to Dr Martel afterwards – oh, not letters, as such. Only notes, first to say that he is a POW on the mainland and treated reasonably well and, then, again, once he has returned to Berlin (what is left of it). It merely seems right to inform him of the facts, that is all – as if he still feels the doctor may need an address for matters of business; that he will sends missives across Europe to demand proper milk supplies for children or explain why nobody has yet supplied the Kommandant with the full number of bicycles requested.

He passes on information, anyway, that is all: that he has heard – regrettably, he believes the source to be reliable – that Ernst passed away in a POW camp in a Balkans, not as fortunate in his prison as Richter. Martel does not write back, not for a long time, and then only the briefest of notes, saying that life (the Colonel will be glad to hear) is finally returning to normal on the island, if there is such a thing as normal any more, which he doubts.

Now that Richter is required to visit England, to attend a conference in London, he writes again. He adds that he would be pleased to meet Dr Martel again, if it should be convenient, but he throws the note away. He writes it again, and casts the second sheet into the wastepaper basket also. He would, he thinks, surely be an unwanted ghost of a best-forgotten time.

And yet he writes the letter a third time. After all, Dr Martel is at liberty to refuse. He can no longer order him, and the man has argued with him enough times before for Richter not to doubt that he will turn him down if he chooses. 

*

Richter waits for them, as arranged, in a tea shop in London. He notes in amusement that it could hardly be more English. He studies the rather short menu carefully and pretends he is not nervous; there is no reason to be nervous.

There is no mistaking Martel when he walks in through the door: contrasted against him, the tea shop is suddenly even more cramped than it was before. Time has aged him a little, perhaps, but he looks better than he did back in ’45 after all the months of hunger and strain, and he really is as tall as Richter had remembered, more so, maybe. Mrs Martel hurries in behind him, catching something in the door. She’s looking better, and smarter. Richter has never seen her looking anything other than worried, though that, unfortunately, had been an inevitability of the situation.

Richter rises to his feet, both in politeness and so they will not miss him and the table he has saved for them. He holds out a hand without thinking, and has time enough to fear it is a presumption, but Dr Martel shakes his hand easily, and then they sit down and order their tea.

“Not blackberry,” says Olive, with a quick smile.

Dr Martel grins back at her. “No. Shall we complain? Demand some – acorn coffee, too, while we’re at it.”

“Philip,” she says, and then casts a brief, anxious look at Richter.

Martel only leans back in his chair. “So, back to the world of academia, is it?” he asks Richter. Whatever the doctor may feel about this meeting, he retains the knack of making everything seem easier, more normal. “You said something about a conference?”

“Yes,” Richter says. He thinks he should make the usual civil enquiries next, but given what the answers may be, he is unwilling. He does not know how they would take such questions from him, even now. The question can be loaded enough these days, even when it isn’t from someone so unfortunately involved. He shifts in his chair, but decides he must be direct. He looks up. “Forgive me if I seem – you see, I was not sure you would want to come.”

Martel leans forward then, leaning his head on his hand, though Olive frowns at him for it. “I did wonder what possessed me to agree.” Then he smiles. “Curiosity, maybe? Anyway, the war’s over, isn’t it? We’re not going to get anywhere if we sit around holding grudges. We’ve already proved that enough times. Best try to avoid doing it again, don’t you think?”

The end of the war is a little more complicated elsewhere, certainly in Germany, but Richter only nods. He’s more amused than offended at Martel’s honesty. Anything less would disappoint him by now.

“ _Philip_ ,” says Olive, but then she can’t think of anything more polite to say herself, it seems. She gives an awkward smile, and then casually answers the question Richter didn’t ask. Clare is, she says, with a little hesitation, as well as can be expected, and Clive – Clive is back.

Richter nods again, tells her he is glad to hear it, and then she politely enquires after his family. He keeps the slight smile on his face as he thinks out his response. In this gap between question and answer, Anna is still alive, or he can pretend that it is so. “They do well enough,” he says. Yes, he thinks, Anna is back at the university, as ever – wrapped up in the nuances of words, in her own language and that of others, moving between them and no doubt failing to see any telegram he sent to notify her of his safe arrival here, frustrating and brilliant woman that she is. Then he attends closely to his tea, stirring it again unnecessarily.

“You know, we never asked,” Olive says suddenly. “But I suppose – of course we didn’t. _Do_ you have children?”

He shakes his head. “No, no. Anna and I – no.”

“And your wife – Anna, did you say? Where is she – not with you?” she adds, as if she knows or suspects his evasion. She probably does not – but then again Mrs Martel is a perceptive woman. Their meetings have been few and mostly unfortunate, but he has always thought so.

Richter casts the temporary, charming illusion aside. “No, no. She is – she was in Berlin,” he says. “She was with the university – and no, no, I am afraid not. The air raids, you know.”

The Martels glance at each other, and in an indefinable way, he feels something even between the three of them. He understands, though it is illogical. He has participated in a crime against them, directly, though it was not anything he wished to do. Now, their country, if not they, have committed a crime against him, against Anna, and thousands more.

“I am sorry,” says Olive, and her hand goes to Dr Martel’s arm.

Martel straightens himself, helps himself to more milk, and says, “You know why I didn’t reply before, don’t you?”

Richter frowns. It is a turn of the conversation he has not anticipated. “It is entirely understandable, Dr Martel. In the circumstances.”

“Then you don’t,” says Martel, and grins at him suddenly. “Wasn’t a good idea you see, Colonel – no, sorry, Herr Richter now, isn’t it, I suppose? Soon as you lot left the island, everyone on the Controlling Committee was being pestered by British Intelligence. Wanted us all punished as traitors – collaborators.”

“After everything we’d been through!” says Olive, still more outraged than the doctor. “Intelligence is completely the wrong word for them, if you ask me.”

Martel says, “And then they changed their minds again and gave out honours at random. Why not, I suppose? They wanted to come after you – all of you, I should say – they were asking us about war crimes – but they didn’t have much luck with that, which was when they decided that must be because we were all bloody traitors who didn’t put up a fight.”

“Though it was by the orders of the British government that you did not do so? That you surrendered.”

Martel grins again. “Need you ask, Colonel? Sorry. Herr Richter. Whole bloody thing was a mess. Complete chaos. We could almost have wished you lot back with us.”

Richter smiles distantly. “ _Almost_ I think being the operative word, yes?”

“What do you think, Col– Herr Richter?”

“I think, Dr Martel,” says Richter, “that your tea will be growing cold.” It’s Doktor Richter, he should say; he would like to say that Dieter would be simpler. He says neither.

Olive hides a smile.

“Are you saying I still talk too much, Herr Richter? I don’t know why I agreed to come.” Martel picks up the tea cup, and then gives Richter a curious look. “You know, didn’t you tell me you were from Wiesbaden, not Berlin?”

Richter tidies his cup, saucer and spoon unnecessarily. “Ah. Yes, and so I am, but we moved later to Berlin. Anna, you see –”

“No, no,” says Martel. “I was only thinking – weren’t you occupied by our lot after the last war?”

In answer, Richter only smiles again.

“And then Guernsey,” says Martel. “And now, again, Germany –”

Olive shakes her head. “It makes you wonder if any of it will ever end.”

“Let us trust that it will, Mrs Martel,” Richter says, and he can address her without reproach now.

“Hope for the best?” She finally smiles at him. 

Richter glances first at Martel, and then back at Olive and gives a small, precise shrug. “What else can we do?”

* * *

**Author's Note:**

> II. It’s established in the series that Richter has connections with those involved with the plot to kill Hitler (mainly in S1 ep. “Treason”, which features a fictional General involved in the conspiracy – von Wittke). Admiral Hüffmeier, a fanatical Nazi also arrived in the Islands in July 1944. 
> 
> III. The AU element is in the British aid not arriving until December rather than November, for which messing with a rl event that was already bad enough, I apologise. Incidents mentioned here come via (as does any other historical info in the fic) Barry Turner’s Outpost of Occupation: How the Channel Islands Survived Nazi Rule 1940-1945. Physical health, hunger and lack of morale obviously affected mental health as well, and many German soldiers suffered from what was called “Island madness” and depression. (He cites at least one suicide by an officer of the Feldkommandtur).
> 
> IV. Admiral Hüffmeier ousted von Schmettow (General Müller’s rl equivalent) from his position in March 1945. After this, only two Wehrmacht officers were left in their previous positions. 
> 
> V. Baron von Aufsess, (whose wife, like Richter’s was arrested by the Gestapo), was one of the two Wehrmacht officers left under Hüffmeier’s rule (much to his surprise – he was seen as a particularly good administrator, but was asked to take a harder line). He was the officer who then finally handed the Islands back over to the British, finishing the war in a prisoner of war camp on the mainland.


End file.
